Packet-level traffic allocation for real-time streaming over multipath networks

Abstract

We address packet-level traffic allocation problem for realtime media streaming under multipath network environment. Based on an in-depth analysis of multipath real-time streaming model, also considering fluctuation of multipath network status as well as burst of media sending rate, we suggest that traffic load should be allocated to paths in proportion to the paths' available bandwidths, which minimizes the overall bandwidth overload probability. Moreover, due to the smallest transmission unit is packet, in order to execute the traffic allocation policy exactly, weighted size-aware packet distribution algorithm is proposed to avoid the actual traffic deviation due to variance of packet sizes. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm outperforms other traditional algorithms, especially for reducing packet late arrivals, which has negative impaction in real-time transmission. © 2009 ICST Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering.